


Rites of Spring

by elijah_was_a_prophet



Category: Ancient Phrygian Religion & Lore
Genre: Castration, Emetophobia, Epistolary, Flogging, Impregnation, Other, Recreational Drug Use, Religious Cults
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:08:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21941911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elijah_was_a_prophet/pseuds/elijah_was_a_prophet
Summary: The worship of Cybele is a dangerous game.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 6
Collections: Yuletide Madness 2019





	Rites of Spring

**Author's Note:**

  * For [seinmit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seinmit/gifts).



**An Account Of Worshipping Cybele**

**By [REDACTED], 1972**

_These are the rites of our Goddess who is God, our Father of Nations and Mother of Millions who through his labor pains has given birth to her great host of worshippers mutilated into the Divine Form. He came with those of the Old World but found her people in the sugarcane fields and serving houses. His presence hung over the freedom-seekers and the wild people of the highlands, and many found her perfect in body and mind._ \- Dinah Lew, “On Our Lady”

_And, through utter disgust with love, made yourselves something else than men—_ Ancient hymn

  
  


Cybele’s worshippers are easy to spot, especially the ones that have done scarification or gotten tattoos, but it was a lot of trouble locating any of their sacred groves The cult doesn’t take kindly to outsiders. It took a three hour car ride, four bribes, and giving a street kid half the change in our car before being allowed to talk to the Second Mother, head of the Persimmon Valley cult. She granted permission to attend after our party claimed to be interested in converting. (The one and only time lying has been allowed in journalism.)

“The new ones always get scared,” she said. “But Our Father is a demanding goddess, and we give her whatever she wants.”

After being assured of the group's ability to handle the rite she blindfolded everyone and confiscated our cameras. Then everyone was pushed into the back of the pickup truck. She drove to the grove down nauseating back country roads. At one point the car stopped for her to converse with an unseen man, who gave her four freshly killed hogs which sat in our laps. Warm blood oozed down the sides of the truck bed and onto the road. After maybe thirty minutes she made the final stop. In the grove a group of maybe eighty people, all clustered around a dais on which sat a large wooden chair, larger than any human could ever use.

Cybele was sitting in that large chair, radiating a terrifying and deadly energy. Not a single person cannot remember how she looked now. Our minds have suppressed the memories. There was a collective rush of fear at the sight of Cybele that lasts to this day, possibly the same fear that blocks any recollection of her face.

Since it wasn’t a holiday the ceremony was supposed to be five hours. Us outsiders kept silent as the worshipers talked casually. There was a fire pit on the side of the clearing where enormous iron kettles and pots hung. The pigs which had sat in our laps were being gutted, their entrails dropped into tubs of water and their bristles hand-scraped. A man with a mallet cracked their skulls open and mixed the brains with eggs, which he scrambled in a cast iron pan. Others took the pig's livers and laid them in a tray for examination. At an unknown signal the crowd fell silent and went to the kettles. A strange strong tea was poured and drank. We each received a small portion in a clay cup. It burned like rubbing alcohol and tasted like rotten peach. Second Mother smiled at our disgusted faces.

“Lady’s slipper, Venus’ hair fern, fairy wand, Adam-and-Eve root, love-in-winter, Dutchman’s pipe, and fringe tree. Strong stuff.”

“Is this even safe to drink?”

“Ain’t killed anyone yet.”

Everyone in the clearing stripped naked. A few elderly women picked up brushes and pots of black ink. They painted the others with strange glyphs, repetitive imagery that with a head tilt turned erotic. One man was covered with yonic blooms penetrated by a phallic anther and seminal stamens. Another man’s patterns were less subtle, just a series of maze-like lines centered on his penis.

A chant rose up during the painting. Memory retains only this small fragment.

_We sing to you, dark gods below the earth_

_Hear our prayer!_

_We sing to you, dark gods below the earth_

_Hear our prayer!_

_Cybele comes to reclaim her sword_

_So we will offer our own_

_Cybele comes to reclaim her sword_

_So we will offer our own_

“Alright?” Second Mother asked after the chant had ended. She was wearing only ink and sweat, her hair tied away from her face by a kerchief.

“Hanging on. What’s next?”

“A conception. This week I’m singing the conjugal blessing.”

Cybele was walking around, passing out almonds to any woman who’d hold her hands out long enough. They ate them greedily and then hunched over in pain. That was concerning enough, but then Second Mother began to sing. Cybele came and stood behind her, emitting raw power. Those who had eaten the almonds crawled to the dias. Their stomachs were beginning to swell. Many vomited black pitch and white blossoms. It stank of bile and the strange tea.

An orgy began. The women on the ground were fucked like cows in stocks, bodies pulled between men and other women alike. Some men fucked each other or sucked cock while some women grabbed each other’s breasts and fingered one another. Their bodies ran slick with cum and sweat and in some cases piss. Cybele stroked the heads of those women who carried her child, kissed their foreheads and let them clutch at her breasts like children. The fucking and crying went on for at least two hours, possibly more, during which time not a single person in our party moved.

After the crowd tired of carnal pursuit incense was lit and a second round of tea was passed around. This one we were not allowed. It smelled of jasmine and was a light green color. Second Mother said it contained ginseng, or possibly ginger. Her voice was too hoarse from sex and singing to understand.

Two muscular figures in black robes appeared with cat o’ nine tails. Both men and women lined up to be lashed, screaming in overjoyed agony when it hit their flesh. Others began to stomp the ground and rhythmically rake their nails over themselves, scraping and smearing the glyphs. One woman fell to the ground shaking with another woman’s teeth lodged in her breasts. Her stomach was uncomfortably swollen with whatever strange creature Cybele was making her carry. 

A wail went up. Two circles of dancers formed, spinning and dripping fresh scarlet. The whipping-men lashed at their ankles, making the dancers go faster and faster. Some collapsed and were dragged to the center, where Cybele sat serenely on her stool. She held a butcher’s knife in one hand and shears in the other. 

_MINE?_ she asked. _DO ANY OF YOU MEN WISH TO BECOME MY ATTIS? TO GIVE ME MY SWORD?_

“I do!” cried a feeble voice. It belonged to a young man, covered in semen and sweat and ink.

Cybele grew a terrible grin. _DANIEL. MY SERVANT. MY NEW ATTIS._ She kissed him deeply, then pulled him into her lap. Her blades gleamed.

Four people held him down as she took her knife in hand and sliced his penis off, right at the base. There was a spurt of blood and the crowd screamed. She then took her shears and lopped off his testicles. I wanted to vomit. Cybele attached the stolen body parts to herself with some sort of flesh magic, then passed Daniel’s limp body off to the muscular figures. From a bag beside her she drew out more sharp implements.

The attendees lined up before their goddess and let her draw their blood and then kiss it away. Some she pricked their tongues with scalpels, while others had their nipples and even genitalia needled. Many seemed to orgasm on the spot from the piercing. One of the women, bleeding from the tongue and clit, gave Cybele a blowjob. 

“They haven’t run yet!” said one of the acolytes when he saw us. “You ain’t scare easily, do you?”

At this point several members of our party were sitting with their heads between their knees, fighting to remain conscious.

One of the swollen women bent in half, bloody fluid and semen dripping down her thighs. She cried out in pain as an enormous wave rippled down her abdomen. Other women and men came to her aid but were distracted as the entire host of supernaturally gravid worshippers went into labor. They squatted where they were in the clearing to give birth, biting their hands and moaning. Wet cloths were pressed to their foreheads and they were given mouthfuls of liquor, straight from Mason jars. 

Cybele held a flail above the crowd and shook it. _THIS IS THE BLESSING OF MY SEED._ The people still standing stamped the earth and wailed. One of the women, screaming, pushed out a kid-but a kid of the capucine kind. Another woman gave birth to a ball with green tendrils. There were jewel colored eggs, masses of wet fur, black cats, enormous flowers, entire crystals, human heads, strings of teeth, all sorts of terrible things covered in amniotic fluid. And when they were birthed they were laid at Cybele’s feet in offering.

“Music!” someone called. Instruments were brought out, sistrums and tambourines and other idiophones. Second Mother was brought a harp and she sang this song, voice restored by time and birth-magic:

_Here is the tumult of cymbals and timbrels_

_And the flute player brings his pipe_

_It is right for us to do the lively dance_

_It is right to crown ourselves in ivy_

_We do these things for you, mother-father_

_We do these things because they are right._

We all blacked out and awoke in a worshiper's shack, all naked and laying in pools of our own drool and vomit.

“Y'all had a bad reaction to our mother’s singing,” the worshiper said said. “It was crazy. Not a single one of us could pull any of you apart.”

Our bodies were smeared with blood, adorned with scratches and bite-bruises. The stench of sex hung in the air, and many of us had the bodily soreness that comes afterwards. 

"What happened?" asked one of our cameramen. His hair was stuck to his face with dried semen.

The worshiper smiled. “You gave a good show post-service. I think Cybele will want y'alls swords next.”

_Many ask: why Cybele? The answer is simple: she is our mother. He is our father. She is our bridegroom. He is our bride. She shares his body for the entire world’s pleasure. What can we do but love her in return?_ \- Harold Bloom, “On the Love of Our Goddess”

**Author's Note:**

> Any feedback on the POV would be appreciated-I'm not sure if it comes across as first-person or a proper epistolary.
> 
> 12/30/19- updated based on feedback


End file.
